1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of modular card issuance systems. More particularly, the invention relates to a modular card issuance system that allows solely the function modules of a card issuance system to determine the system's configuration and report this information to a main system controller upon system power-up.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Modular card issuance systems are used to produce large volumes of a variety of different types of personalized identity documents including, but not limited to, credit cards, licenses, personal identification cards, calling cards, and booklets such as passports, among other types of documents. Generally, these systems include a number of different modules that perform various functions. These functions can include but are not confined to magnetic encoding, embossing, smart card programming, laser printing, cleaning, and laminating of personalized documents. Examples of card issuance systems are numerous.
Referring particularly now to U.S. Pat. No. 5,204,669, entitled Automatic Station Identification Where Function Modules Automatically Initialize, issued Apr. 20, 1993 to Dorfe et. al., and assigned to the assignee of the present invention, a modular card producing system and method are disclosed for dynamically assigning addresses to a plurality of programmable function modules within the system. The system disclosed in the '669 patent utilizes a primary controller unit to query the system function modules in order to assign each module a unique address and to determine the connection sequence of each function module. Known modular card issuance systems require a primary or master controller to arbitrate between the function modules in order to determine the relative sequence between the modules.
Although modular card issuance systems are becoming more technologically advanced, a need still exists for a system that allows function modules within a modular card issuance system to independently establish, (using peer-to-peer communications solely between the modules), the total number of modules in the system, the relative position of each function module in the sequence of system modules, and the identity or module type associated with each function module.